Deadly Nightshade (5 page)

Elizabeth stared at him, her face paling under her tan. Howland, who was leaning against the desk, put his hand up to his chin, stroked it. Elizabeth heard the slight scratch of afternoon whiskers.

“What can we do?” she said.

“I, for one, am going to talk to your West Tisbury police chief, have her or one of her patrolmen watch your house.” He turned and looked at her, then at Howland. “I'll go by your place as often as I can.” He thrust his hands deeper into his pockets. “I still have a valid gun permit.”

“Gun?” Elizabeth turned back from the counter.

“Your car is not exactly inconspicuous,” Howland said. “A white Rolls-Royce convertible?”

“The more conspicuous the better.” Domingo patted his pocket. “I don't trust the Oak Bluffs cops. I don't trust the selectmen. I don't trust anyone on the Harbor Advisory Committee. The recently deceased Bernie Marble had ties to all of them. Owned a bar on Pequot Avenue, in partnership with two of the selectmen.”

“The Good Times?” Elizabeth said. The radio in the shack crackled with static, and the three listened until it cut off.

“That's another of his properties. Meatloaf Staples is part owner of that. The two selectmen were partners with Bernie in the Sand Bar, two doors down from the Good Times.”

“Meatloaf,” Howland said thoughtfully. “He was always with Bernie, almost like a bodyguard.”

“That is correct,” Domingo said. “He knows how to spot power and cozy up to it.”

“The advantages of not being in power.” Howland moved away from the desk, headed toward the door. “I need to get home to feed my dogs.”

“You better keep them hungry.” Domingo moved out of Howland's way. “You never know when someone may find his way into the duchy. You want them hungry, ready to attack.”

“Tigger and Rover, attack dogs?” Elizabeth said. “I don't think so.”

“Damnation!” Howland halted at the door, his hand still on the knob, and looked toward the parking lot. A van had pulled into a slot. The door opened and an obese man slid out of the driver's seat. His two small feet touched the macadam. He faced the van and slammed the door, pushed his glasses back up his small nose, tugged his baseball cap down on his forehead, pulled his tan jacket over his gut, pulled his pant legs away from his crotch, and looked over at the harbormaster's shack.

“Meatloaf,” Howland said. “What's he doing here?”

“Get going with those entries, Ms. Elizabeth.” Domingo turned to her. “We're running out of time.”

Meatloaf Staples stepped onto the catwalk, holding the railings on either side with small hands that seemed out of proportion to his body.

As he approached Victoria, who was sitting on the bench outside the shack, Elizabeth, still at the computer, watched her grandmother's reflection in the computer screen.

Victoria looked up from her writing and shaded her eyes. “Good afternoon,” she said. Meatloaf turned his head toward her without answering. He pushed his sunglasses back onto his nose. Drops of sweat ran off his forehead in rivulets, traveled down the side of his face, and dripped onto the wooden catwalk, where they made fat dots that spread out on the boards. Sweat blotched the armpits of his tan shirt.

“How rude,” Victoria said softly, although clearly enough that Meatloaf must have heard. Inside the shack, Elizabeth laughed.

“Watch yourselves.” Domingo glanced out the window.

Meatloaf stepped over the doorsill and into the shack.

“How can I help you?” Domingo said civilly.

Elizabeth turned back to the computer and began to enter receipts she hadn't yet sorted.

Howland leaned back against the desk and folded his arms across the chest of his thrift-shop shirt.

Meatloaf removed his sunglasses, took a crumpled handkerchief out of his pocket, and wiped his glasses. He lifted his baseball cap with ARAUJO SEPTIC SYSTEMS and mopped his forehead. He put his sunglasses on, stuffed the handkerchief back into his pocket, and straightened his baseball cap. Elizabeth watched his reflection in the screen, heard his heavy breathing.

“I'm here about a complaint,” Meatloaf said finally.

“Won't you sit down?” Domingo indicated the empty aluminum lawn chair. Meatloaf pulled the chair to the end of the shack, scraping it along the floor. He turned around, his back to the chair, put his hands on the armrests, and eased himself into it. Aluminum rubbed against aluminum; the synthetic webbing squeaked. He faced the three of them, Domingo standing beside the door, Howland leaning against the desk at the end of the shack, and Elizabeth at the computer on the side.

“What's she doing out there?” Meatloaf looked at Domingo and jerked his head toward Victoria. He clasped his hands together on top of his belly.

“Writing poetry,” Howland said.

“I asked you, Mingo, not him.” Meatloaf turned his head toward Domingo, his eyes hidden by his sunglasses.

“It's public property. She can sit there if she wants.” Domingo folded his arms over his chest like Howland. Elizabeth made soft clicking noises on the keyboard as she watched the reflections of Meatloaf and Domingo on the screen.

“What's the complaint?” Domingo said.

Overhead, a seagull cried, a long, mewling call ending in a series of short squawks.

“Seems you have one of the selectman's nieces working for you as dock attendant. Is that right?”

“That's correct.” Domingo remained next to the door, his arms still folded. Water splashed gently against the pilings. A small motorboat went out of the harbor.

Domingo narrowed his eyes at Meatloaf. “Allison Phipps.”

Elizabeth paused briefly, then continued typing. The osprey cried. Wind lifted papers on the counter next to her, and she put a rounded beach stone on top of them to hold them down. The telephone rang. She got up from the desk and answered it.

After a long wait, Meatloaf continued. “Her aunt lodged a complaint against you.”

“What for?”

“You pretend you don't know?” Meatloaf laced his hands high on his belly. Water reflections, stirred up by the passing boat, danced on the ceiling of the shack.

The radio crackled, and a man's voice came over it. “Oak Bluffs Harbor—this is—yacht—” Static garbled the message. Elizabeth pushed her chair back, got up, and lifted the radio mike off its hook on the wall next to Domingo.

“Vessel calling the Oak Bluffs harbormaster,” Elizabeth said in her low voice. Domingo, Meatloaf, and Howland held their poses as if for a time exposure. “This is the Oak Bluffs harbormaster on channel nine. Your radio message is breaking up. Please repeat. Over.”

“She's not the harbormaster.” Meatloaf's voice was high-pitched, almost a soprano. He moved his head slightly to look at Elizabeth as she spoke into the radio mike. “You got her taking over your job?”

Domingo said nothing.

The voice came through more clearly. “This is the sailing yacht Sea Slide. I reserved a slip for five nights.”

Elizabeth directed the boat into the harbor and told the skipper how to pay. She hung up the mike and sat again, where she could watch Meatloaf 's reflection.

“Sea Slide, eh?” Meatloaf moved in the chair. “Where's she coming from?”

“I can tell you in just a sec.” Elizabeth keyed something into the computer.

“The program can track boats from the time they first contact us until they leave here.” Howland moved toward the screen, which was showing a list of boat names. “Sea Slide called us several weeks ago to request a slip.”

Elizabeth scrolled down to the boat's name while Howland stood over her, one hand on the top oi the computer monitor, the other in his pocket.

“It's all in here,” Elizabeth said. “Sea Slide left the Turks and Caicos four weeks ago, stopped at Saint Croix, and then sailed directly here to the Vineyard.”

After a long silence, Meatloaf spoke, as if the information Elizabeth had given him meant nothing. He glanced toward Howland, then back at Domingo. “Looks like you need some better operating procedures.” He wiggled his laced fingers.

“What was the selectman's complaint?” Domingo asked.

Meatloaf turned his sunglass gaze to Domingo. “Harassment.”

Howland coughed, then sneezed. He took his handkerchief out of his pocket and blew his nose.

Elizabeth turned from the computer, her lips parted.

“Harassment?” Domingo scowled.

Meatloaf shifted in his chair, and the aluminum frame creaked. “I'm only reporting what Liz Tate said. She's the one who filed the complaint against you, not me.”

“How am I supposed to have harassed her?” Domingo leaned against the wall next to the radio. Looking at the computer screen, Elizabeth could see his jaw clench, could see Howland sit against the desk again, holding his chin in his right hand.

The telephone rang. Elizabeth answered, “Oak Bluffs harbormaster.” She listened. “Let me get your boat's name, its length and beam.” She listened. “And the date you'll be arriving?” Howland, Domingo, and Meatloaf didn't move. Elizabeth clamped the telephone receiver next to her ear with her shoulder, filling out a form as she spoke. “Call on channel nine when you get here.” She hung up the phone and returned to the keyboard.

Howland crossed one foot over the other.

“How am I supposed to have harassed the young woman?” Domingo repeated. He took his cigarette pack out of his pocket, shook one out, stuck it in his mouth, and put the pack back in his pocket. He reached into his pocket for his Zippo, flicked it a couple of times without lighting up, put it back in his pocket, took the cigarette out of his mouth, and held it, unlighted, between his index and third fingers.

“According to Liz Tate, her niece left work last Friday night in tears. She claims you abused her. Verbally.”

Howland grunted, and when Elizabeth looked up at him and saw his expression, she suspected he was holding back some inappropriate witty comment that had occurred to him.

“Verbal abuse is not harassment,” Domingo said.

“Harassment, abuse, same thing.” Meatloaf unclasped his hands and pushed his sunglasses back with his forefinger.

“Tell Liz Tate to make her complaint to me in writing.” Domingo put the unlighted cigarette in his mouth and let it dangle from his lower lip. “She set up the procedure.”

“She's going to love this.” Meatloaf hoisted himself out of the chair, stretched his arms, and yawned hugely. “She's no lady when you get her upset. Don't say I didn't warn you.”

“Thanks.” Domingo's cigarette danced on his lower lip.

The radio static crackled. The telephone rang. Howland leaned down and scratched his bare right ankle. A suntanned couple wearing identical madras shirts and khaki shorts came to the window. The woman held a credit card.

Elizabeth got up from her chair. “I'll be right with you,” she told the couple at the window. She picked up the phone and said, “Please hold; I'll be with you in a moment.” She lifted the radio mike. “Vessel calling Oak Bluffs harbormaster, this is the Oak Bluffs harbormaster.”

Meatloaf shook his head. “I feel sorry for you, Mingo. Wouldn't want to be in your shoes.” He lumbered out the door and squeezed past the couple in madras shirts. “Pardon me,” he said, then walked down the catwalk to the parking lot.

Howland turned to Domingo, while Elizabeth finished giving directions on the radio. She filled out a charge form for the couple at the window, and took the telephone message.

“Allison Phipps is that skinny blond girl, isn't she?”

Domingo nodded.

“She's sneaky. I wouldn't trust her,” Elizabeth said.

A boat whistled. Elizabeth looked up and saw the small passenger ferry Cuttyhunk heading into the channel. People in bright summer clothes leaned on the rail. In the parking lot, three tour buses lined up, doors open. The drivers stood together in a small cluster, talking.

Howland pulled a chair out from the desk and sat facing the others. He crossed his right leg over his left.

Domingo unclenched his hands and thrust them into his pockets. He watched Meatloaf, his large dark eyes half-closed.

“Do you have a special reason for not trusting her?” he said to Elizabeth finally.

“A couple of times, I've come into the shack and she's been sitting at the desk, as if she'd been looking through stuff.”

“Did you actually see her looking through something?”

The ferry's engines went into reverse, and the water in the channel foamed and bubbled. The ferry pulled alongside the bulkhead. A crew member on deck tossed a line to a darkly tanned man on shore, who dropped the end loop over a bollard. A young woman with red hair turned an iron crank that ratcheted the gangplank from ferry to shore. Then the tanned man secured the gangplank with lines.

“No, I didn't actually see her; it was just a feeling.”

“A feeling,” Domingo said. “A feeling. Can you document a feeling?”

“To hell with you.” Elizabeth felt her face flush. “I don't trust her. That's all.”

“Keep an eye on her, then,” Domingo said. “If you see her doing anything she shouldn't be doing, doc—”

“Document it,” Elizabeth replied, interrupting him.

On the shore, passengers from the ferry called to one another as they loaded into the tour buses. Meatloaf opened the door of his van and hoisted himself up onto the driver's seat with a small jump. His feet dangled above the pavement, the toes of his shoes pointed at each other. He wrote something in a notebook held high on his stomach. Elizabeth looked from Domingo to Howland to Meatloaf and then back at Domingo.

The unsmoked cigarette flipped up and down on Domingo's lower lip as he spoke. “That's the start of it.”

The last passenger had walked down the gangplank and onto a tour bus. Blue smoke puffed out of exhaust pipes as bus engines started up. The buses backed out of their parking spaces and left. The parking lot was quiet again.

“What do you want us to do?” Howland watched Meatloaf through the window as he spoke to Domingo.

“Document everything.” Domingo took the cigarette out of his mouth. “Dates, times, names, everything that transpires. Everything. Document going to the bathroom.”

“Told you so,” Elizabeth said to Howland.

A sailboat entered the channel under power. A crew member stood on the cabin roof, tying the loose mainsail onto the boom with long white ribbons. Elizabeth reached for the radio mike and directed the boat to a slip. A slim Cigarette boat followed the sailboat, powerful engines so loud, Elizabeth could barely hear the radio. The phone rang and she answered it. She saw the masts of two sailboats heading for the harbor entrance. A man walked up the catwalk toward the shack, a couple following him, and, behind them, a woman with two small boys. Elizabeth went out onto the deck, leaned over, and shouted above the engine noise, indicating a slip number for the Cigarette boat and pointing to the slip.